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Gay ex-Lowe's worker: I was harassed at Orangeburg store

A former Lowe's employee is alleging in a federal lawsuit that he was discriminated against for years at the store because he's gay, including by a manager who asked for oral sex and co-worker who teased when he cut his finger that he might infect someone with AIDS.

Gay ex-Lowe's worker: I was harassed at Orangeburg store

A former Lowe's employee is alleging in a federal lawsuit that he was discriminated against for years at the store because he's gay, including by a manager who asked for oral sex and co-worker who joked when he cut his finger that he might infect someone with AIDS.

ORANGEBURG – A former Lowe's employee is alleging in a federal lawsuit that he was discriminated against for years at the store because he's gay, including by a manager who asked for oral sex and co-worker who joked when he cut his finger that he might infect someone with AIDS.

Adam Haimowitz, 32, of Tallman, says his frequent complaints to the human resources department fell on deaf ears and the company fired him in retaliation for his testimony on behalf of another gay employee who sued for sexual harassment.

Haimowitz, a sales specialist who worked nearly 11 years at Lowe's on Route 303 until his firing in August 2014, is seeking an unspecified amount of money in the suit filed last month in federal court in White Plains.

"If one or two people stand up, maybe it will encourage other people to stand up or come forward," he told The Journal News. Fellow employees, he said, insulted him about his sexual orientation as if it was "a game."

"They got a kick out of it," he said. "I guess they got pleasure out of it."

According to the lawsuit, in March 2014, a woman department manager called him a "whore," explaining herself by saying "gay people sleep around and they are known for it."

It was part of a pattern of sexual harassment that Haimowitz says started shortly after he began working at the store in 2003 and escalated in 2012 after he was deposed and testified in a federal lawsuit filed in 2012 by Edward Marse of Sloatsburg.

Marse, now 49, alleged numerous incidents of "sex-based" harassment, including instances where employees repeatedly called him derogatory, homophobic names, as well as times when a group of employees described him as someone who performs oral sex. That lawsuit was settled in April 2014, but Marse told the newspaper he could not disclose the amount under terms of the agreement.

A month after the settlement, Haimowitz says he was written up twice, having not been written up in four years. One instance was for an alleged "time and attendance infraction" and the other for putting a piece of carpet down the wrong way and using strong language on the sales floor, the lawsuit says. Four months later, Haimowitz was fired under the "pretext of 'making inappropriate comments on the sales floor," the lawsuit says.

Marse said he was "heartbroken" about what happened to Haimowitz. "To have had Adam allegedly targeted and wrongfully terminated is a complete disgrace," he said.

Karen Cobb, a spokeswoman for Lowe's, declined comment on the lawsuit.